Beating Sonics Earns a Shrug

The circumstances were strangely similar. Last game of the exhibition schedule, the Seattle SuperSonics as the opponent, exactly one year apart.

The attitude, however, was much different. Whereas Coach Del Harris blasted his Lakers after the Oct. 25, 1996, game in Boise, Idaho, for lacking the proper attitude and approach needed to prepare for the regular season, he offered praise this year.

“That’s what good teams do,” he said. “They progress. If you are going to be a success, it’s not because you never fail. You just don’t let the failures defeat you. You take a step up after you get knocked down. And we’ve done that.

“It’s been good. The only bump in the road we had was at Denver, and part of that was probably the shock from having Shaq [O’Neal] knocked out of the game early. But when you look at it, we’ve played six games in a short period, four in the last five days, and we won five.”

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It may have been the last game before the start of the regular season, but most Lakers, rightly so, weren’t about to contemplate a carryover effect. So Saturday’s 85-79 victory over the SuperSonics had little, if any, emotional value with the teams days away from beginning their likely battle for the division title, if not the top spot in the conference.

“This wasn’t a pre-Pacific showdown or anything,” Laker guard Derek Fisher said. “This time of the year, it’s more about working on the things you need to work on instead of worrying about the opponent. You definitely think about it because Seattle is a good team and a division rival. But you don’t get into any hoo-rahs about this is Seattle and let’s make a statement.”